This summer Hahn became the 17th member of the Jones Beach Lifeguard Corps to qualify for a stylish, leather-trimmed black jacket emblazoned with the corps’ seahorse logo and “50 Years of Service.” He has missed only three summers since he was a rookie in 1962, and is one of eight active members of the 50-years-plus club. At Field 5, also known as the East Bathhouse Ocean, he is a fatherly, wisecracking voice of reason, imparting wisdom to the rookie guards, massaging the egos of the veterans, defusing the tension when those egos clash. “I am lucky to have him,” says the field’s captain, Tom Curtin, who’s been at Jones Beach for 39 years.

At 6 feet 3½, with an arms-outstretched wingspan of just under 7 feet, a booming voice and a laugh to match, Hahn is a field of energy unto himself. Most of the time he is as casual, gentlemanly and unpretentious as he is loud, and his joy for the job is obviously contagious: He and his wife of 49 years, Gerry, raised four children in the house on Woodbine Avenue, in Merrick Woods, that they bought in 1968, and all four — Erik (Mepham High School class of ’85), Joanna (Mepham ’87), Julie (Calhoun ’91) and Jen (Calhoun ’97) — became Jones Beach lifeguards.

On the stand, in the shack or in the shower, Hahn will burst into song — Sinatra, Motown, rock ’n’ roll, you name it — at the slightest provocation, and he enjoys the needling by even the 20-year-olds of his other quirks of appearance, diet and habit. Consider his sunglasses. They are literally held together by a shoestring, and he has proudly worn them that way for several years. In fact he has more pairs just like them. They’re a brand he once bought in bulk and sold at a discount to other lifeguards, but the side pieces kept breaking, so he drilled holes in what was left of the frame, strung a shoelace through them and now pulls them on like a pair of goggles. “I thought this was an ingenious idea,” he laughs. “And they stay on your face better.”

From Holland to America

Leopold Hahn was born in Amsterdam on Nov. 1, 1943, three years after Nazi Germany began its occupation of the Netherlands. He was the second of Frederick and Alberta Francina Hahn’s three children, and his Jewish father — who, ironically, had been born in Germany — owned a leather goods factory, the Hahn Trading Company. It was taken over by a German officer who, in a Schindler-like twist, had no interest in running it, and left Frederick to do so.